While we were touring the peninsula, I figured we should
head north as far as possible on the westerly side. Not much to offer except a lot of oil industry stuff. A few lakes looked promising but offered no
access and we had to pass. We managed
to find some beach access near a dock and parked there for the night. Great ocean views with a beach that the dog
could play on. An occasional helicopter
would buzz over us to land at a very nearby landing pad. I assumed they were flying to and from the
oil rigs that were visible not too far out.
These helicopters proved to be a huge problem later when we were trying
to sleep. The next morning, Vanessa
took the dog for a walk along the beach while I whipped up some breakfast and
shot some pictures of a pair of eagles flying along the treeline.
Our tour of the peninsula was done and we headed back
towards Anchorage. A few people
mentioned the beauty of Girdwood, which was about 20-30 miles south of
Anchorage and so we headed there, paying another visit to the park in Soldotna
as well as the local brewery there.
Girdwood is a very lovely ski resort town, nestled amongst
some snow covered peaks with nearby glaciers.
The majority of the trails started at the nearby ski lodge and we headed
there for the night.
The following morning we hit the trail that led up to
the top of the ski lifts, a 2.2 mile trail that went straight up the mountain,
delighted to find some blueberries along the way.
This particular trail is part of a local race where
contestants have 10hrs to climb the hill as many times as possible, taking the
tram back down each time. The day was
rather dreary with a light mist that proved to be extremely cold at the top of
the trail. Having Ginger with us
prevented us from going inside to lodge to warm up and so we immediately headed
back down the trail.
The following morning we hit up the areas most popular
trail, the Winner Trail, a 5 mile trail that went through some amazing woods
and ended up overlooking a river. There
was a hand tram that you could use to cross the gorge and continue but it was
down for repairs and we had to turn back.
The next morning we researched the Turnagain Arm
trails since Summer had recommended them to us. It turns out that there was a recent bear attack on this trail
resulting in the death of the bear. The
bear’s carcass was left along the trail and the trail was closed for the meantime. This meant that the only section of trail
open to the public was only a few miles long and so we passed and headed on
into Anchorage. |
| Only 2.2 miles to get to the lodge |
 |
| Plush carpeting |
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